


let the heavens guide you home

by amuk



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Homesickness, Humor, Missing Scene, Slice of Life, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-06
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 23:00:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29233422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amuk/pseuds/amuk
Summary: Countless stars glimmered in the sky above, looking nothing at all like the constellations at home. There weren’t the real ones that Riku tried to teach him: Vega, Cyrus, Ursa. Nor were there any of the ones Kairi made up: the shark, the pinching crab, the raft. Staring up at the sky, Sora felt adrift, untethered, like he was on that raft Riku insisted they’d make and was floating through the sea alone. Luckily, Donald and Goofy were here to steer him to shore.
Relationships: Donald Duck & Goofy, Donald Duck & Goofy & Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Donald Duck & Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Goofy & Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Kairi & Riku & Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Kudos: 14





	let the heavens guide you home

**Author's Note:**

> For the KH Trios zine! I got the pint-sized trio and wanted to play with my favourite Disney movie (Lion King!) and homesickness.

Sora burped as he lay down on the soft, dewy grass. The long blades tickled the fur on his back and his burp sounded more like a wheezy roar than it ought to. Rubbing his belly with a paw, he sighed happily from the feeling he only got after overfilling himself on a good meal. It was a slightly uncomfortable feeling, like he wanted to burst through his pants, but luckily he wasn’t wearing any for once.

“Sora!” Donald quacked as he slowly landed on the ground. Despite transforming into a different bird, he still sounded oddly duck-like, as though that was the one characteristic that magic couldn’t change. Then again, he was still a bird; maybe they could all make that sound.

With a satisfied grunt, Goofy lay down on the grass next to him. It was a probably a mistake for a turtle to lie on his back. Sora would just have to roll him over later. “That was soooo good, gosh darn it.” He burped softly. “Oh grawsh, I’m stuffed.”

“Goofy!” Indignant, Donald stomped a foot. Smaller than ever, it didn’t have the desired effect, the noise hardly louder than a cricket’s chirp. He flapped his wings, fuming. “That’s disgusting!”

“How?” Goofy burped again and covered his mouth with a foot. Or well, he tried too anyways. As a turtle, his limbs were far too small for him make any of his usual movements. His slow reactions only made Donald angrier as time went by. “Oops, sorry.”

“You two…” Giving up, an irate Donald sank down in the grass too. He grimaced. “I can’t believe we ate that.”

“I know!” Sora closed his eyes, remembering the nest of slimy, slithering insects that they’d just feasted on. _Insects_! He could just picture Riku’s and Kairi’s reaction to it. If he was still human, he’d probably have reacted the same too. But he wasn’t, so when he had stared at that treasure trove of bugs earlier, he salivated instead of running away. By now he was used to changing as he travelled through worlds, used to the new laws of every universe twisting and contorting his body to belong. Mermaid, Halloween monster, undead pirate—he’d experienced a lot of things while travelling yet this was the strangest so far: he was a lion.

A lion cub, to be exact. As if to make it even odder, Goofy and Donald had transformed into a turtle and bird respectively. From one set of talking animals to another. If he tried to thinking about it too hard, he was going to get a headache. Rubbing his belly once more, he focused on dinner instead. “They tasted so much better than I thought, though.”

“Yeah.” Goofy nodded his head in agreement, stretching his spindly legs above him. “They taste just like chicken.”

Donald looked at them, giving them a flat stare. “Chicken?”

“Oh.” Sora opened his eyes and looked back at Donald. Chicken. Duck. Strange bird. Maybe that hit a little too close to home. Grinning sheepishly, he tried again, “Fish?”

“I don’t think it tastes like fish—” Goofy disagreed, cutting off only when Sora elbowed him in the side. “Ouch! Sora, that…” He trailed off as he noticed Donald’s death glare. Slow to catch up, he whispered, “Why’s he angry?”

“Chicken?” Sora whispered back. “Think it’s a relative?”

“I don’t remember any chickens,” Goofy muttered, scrunching up his face as he thought about it. “His uncle, his nephews…” Holding up his feet, he tried counting on them, but he could only get so far with only three toes per leg. “Nope, no chickens.”

Well, that dashed that theory. Sora shrugged carelessly. “Maybe it’s a bird thing?”

“I can hear you two, you know!” Donald growled angrily, and that was a new sound. Maybe that came with the new body. “I ought ta—” He groaned, rubbing his belly. “I’m too full to get angry.”

“Like that’d stop you,” Sora countered, chuckling. Goofy started laughing too and after a moment’s hesitation, Donald joined in. Their laughs echoed in the cool night air. A nearby river gurgled cheerfully, as though wanting to take part too.

Sora lazily scanned his surroundings once more. Around them was paradise, a series of hills covered in leafy trees and sprawling plains. The blazing heat of the day had died down by now. A soft breeze stirred through his fur. All sorts of wild animals roamed about, though maybe it was wrong to think of them as just animals. They might not wear clothes like Goofy or Donald, but they talked all the same. Travelling had really changed his perception on things and he’d be forever staring at books, listening to stray cats, wondering if there was a secret world hidden in a forgotten corner.

Sora ran a tongue over his sharp canines. Even now he could feel the keyblade as he bit onto the hilt, swiping at his enemies with the flick of his head. “Guys, it’s really weird fighting like this.”

“No kidding!” Donald scoffed and if he could, Sora knew he would have crossed his arms by now. “I can’t even use my staff properly.”

“Aiming is hard,” Sora agreed, his tail twitching back and forth slowly as he remembered fighting heartless two times his size. And those were just the grunts—what’d happen when he faced something big?

“Gwarsh, I don’t know.” Goofy rocked back and forth on his shell as he thought about it. “It’s not that bad.”

“You just have to spin your whole body!” Donald grumpily shot back. “And your entire body is a shield!”

“Well, if you put it that way…” Goofy hummed before nodding. “Yeah, I guess so. It’s pretty easy!”

Donald let out an enraged squawk. “For you!”

Sora tried not to laugh again. If only so that Donald’s rage wouldn’t be directed at him. He raised a scrawny paw to the sky. It didn’t quite feel the same as raising a hand, even if the limb was the same. Would there be another world like this? Where they changed bodies entirely? Part of him hoped so. It was just too much fun, finding entire worlds that made his head spin. There wasn’t much rhyme or reason to the rules of the worlds he’d been to and it’d take a greater mind than his to figure it out.

Riku probably could have.

Sora lowered his paw, feeling guilty. Like every world before this, Riku and the king were nowhere to be found. Part of him was thrumming, ready to abscond, to find that gate that would bring his friend home and stop all of this trouble. It’d probably be faster, quicker, to just keep bouncing from world to world until they found the one thing that could stop it all.

There was only so much travelling one could do before they wanted to see the journey end.

Looking up, Sora stared at the night sky. Countless stars glimmered in the sky above, looking nothing at all like the paopu fruit at home. Actually, now that he was looking, nothing above him looked the same. Sora studied the heavens, at the stars that numbered almost as much as the sand at home. There were no familiar constellations above him. There weren’t the real ones that Riku tried to teach him: Vega, Cyrus, Ursa. Nor were there any of the ones Kairi made up: the shark, the pinching crab, the raft. Staring up at the sky, Sora felt adrift, untethered, like he was on that raft Riku insisted they’d make and was floating through the sea alone.

There was nothing he’d recognized up there. “Hey,” Sora asked, still searching for a star from home. “I’ve never seen this sky before.”

“Of course you haven’t!” Donald snapped, snorting scornfully. “You’ve never been here before!”

“No, I mean…” Sora wanted to rub his neck but his limbs didn’t work like that anymore. He settled for flicking his tail. “I don’t recognize any of the constellations.”

“You know constellations, Sora?” Goofy asked curiously.

“Kinda. Riku taught us.” His ears flattened as he remembered the long-ago nights on the island, when he and Kairi would lie on the sand exhausted. Riku, ever at work, would sit in between them, forcing them to stay awake while he pointed out constellation after constellation.

_Why_ Kairi had asked, worn out.

_In the sea, we have no landmarks but that._ Riku had tapped them both on the arms, making sure they didn’t doze off. _It’s so you can find your way home._

All that hard work was for naught. Sora stared at the sky hopelessly. There wasn’t even a single star that reminded him of home. He could never find his way back.

“Oh.” Goofy looked up now to, cocking his head left and right before gasping. “Gosh, I can’t recognize any of them either!”

“What do you know about constellations?” Donald asked derisively, rolling his eyes. “You can’t even read a map.”

“Hey, that’s—” Goofy cut himself off, unable to argue. “Max likes the stars.”

“Max?” Sora asked, raising a brow. That name was new.

“Max!” Brightening up considerably, Goofy grinned. “He’s my son. Gosh, I can’t really show you now, but I have some pictures in my pockets. You’ll love him, he’s the sweetest, bestest, greatest.”

Sora stared at Goofy. If he had fingers, he’d have pinched himself. For now, he settled for, “You have a son?” His incredulous outburst was echoed by a secondary one behind him and Sora turned around to stare at Donald. Raising a brow, he asked, “Wait, you don’t know?”

Donald flushed a beet red. “I…no, I do know it’s just…” He gestured at Goofy with a wing. “What part of that looks like he has a son?”

“You didn’t meet him yet?” Goofy looked surprised. “But I brought him to the castle and everything.”

“I know that! I just…” Donald stayed a bright red, stumbling over his words. “I just keep…you know, he’s your son. I forget that.”

If Goofy was insulted, he didn’t let on. Instead, he clapped his feet eagerly. “When we get back, you guys should meet him!”

“Yeah,” Sora agreed readily. “Definitely.”

“Gwarsh, I wish I could show you his picture now…” Trailing off, Goofy stared at the stars. “Oh!” Excited, he started pointing his foot at the sky. “He looks like that!”

Sora looked up at the stars, raising a brow. “Like stars?” Did Max have freckles or something?

“Uhh, how do I—okay, if you look at that really bright red one, and then at the blue one next to it.” Goofy moved his foot, connecting the stars in the sky with imaginary lines. Sora squinted, trying to find the ones he mentioned. “The green one there, that other one, and that’s Max!”

“I…” Sora frowned, biting his lip. Maybe if he cocked his head or squinted, he’d be able to see it. Rocking side to side, he tilted his head but the stars remained the same.

“I don’t see it,” Donald declared. “I see a teacup.”

“Really? Max doesn’t look like a teacup, I think,” Goofy replied uncertainly. “Maybe the witch cursed him too?”

“No, dummy!” Donald chided him and pointed a wing above him. “The stars over here look like a teacup.”

Sora really couldn’t see that either. However, if he connected the three stars in a row with a few other more scattered ones, he could almost make out a familiar shape. “I see a paopu fruit,” Sora announced.

“What?” Goofy’s moved his head back and forth, trying to find the shapes. “Gwarsh, there are a lot more stars here than I thought. There’s one that’s shaped like a cake. Maybe we could have a tea party with your teacup!”

“Stars don’t work like that,” Donald rebutted, but his usually harsh tone had softened considerably. “I see an ice-cream cone. My nephews love ice-cream.” There was a wistful edge to his voice, a rare softness that was uncharacteristic of him. “And Daisy’s bow’s there too.”

“They must be with Scrooge then.” Sora pointed above him at the oval-ish set of stars he found. “That looks like one of his coins.” He could already hear the clink of gold, see the brim of the older duck’s top hat. The triplets must be hard at work with him.

“And maybe Queen Minnie’s with Daisy,” Goofy suggested cheerfully, caught up in it now. “They could go to the tea-party.”

“With Aerith and Tifa!” Sora agreed. He stretched out on the grass, craning his head back further to see even more stars. Even more familiar faces. “They could take a break and maybe Kairi could join them.”

“And we could have ice-cream,” Donald chimed in, enraptured as he stared up at the sprawling tapestry above. “With Pluto and the King!”

“And Riku,” Sora added, not wanting to leave either of his best friends out of this. It wasn’t hard to find a set of stars that looked like his best friends. As usual, Riku had the grumpiest expression and Kairi was smiling. “It’s going to be a big party.”

“Yeah.” Goofy chuckled, beaming brightly as he turned to Sora. “You know, after we’ve found the King and Riku and stopped the heartless, we should throw a welcome back party. It’d be really fun!”

“We could have it at the castle,” Donald suggested, sounding enthusiastic for once. “It’s really big and we have the fair outside anyways. Then we could invite everyone.”

A party. Sora lit up. He could see Riku, Kairi, Tidus and everyone there. It had been ages since he’d seen them—what did they even look like anymore? What did he talk to them about before? By now, that was impossible to remember. They could spend the whole party catching up, until they were as close as they were before the heartless were released. “Yeah, that’d be great.”

It was strange. His homesickness washed over him, pushed aside by promises of the future. Sora glanced at his two companions, unable to stop smiling. It was almost impossible to get sad with these two around. Even now, he couldn’t stop thinking about the party, food and balloons pushing away fears and worry.

Not that there was anything to fear. With Donald and Goofy, he could do almost anything. They’d save the world and have the best party ever. Sora looked up at the stars again and this time, he didn’t feel as lost in the endless balls of light above him.

_It’s so you can find your way home._

Riku had been right. Sora could always find his way home, no matter how unfamiliar the stars were. All he had to do was squint a little and his friends were there, watching him.


End file.
